Non-eBay sources for those great G1 duplicate knockoffs?

Now that eBay has cracked-down on the trade of Transformer knockoffs, does anyone have any good sources for all those really nice ones that were becoming so common? Like the clear G1 Mirage, the multi-colored Cassette-Robos, the repro Dinobots?

Honestly, I love bootlegs - especially in the case of when they're products that neither Takara nor Hasbro have had the sense to release in spite of fans' constant requests for them.

You can go to Puzzle Zoo in Santa Monica, where they sell the cassette 2-packs for $40, the mini-car copies for $35, and dinobots for about $130. And there's no signage up that indicates that these are anything but legitimate copies.

I don't collect Transformers, but when I saw that it really infuriated me.

Fuck that. I don't think anyone should be buying them, and a retailer like Puzzle Zoo knows exactly what they're doing by selling them.

Don't fool yourself, these things weren't made so that Transformers fans could recapture their youth, they were created so that unscrupulous sellers could pass them off as legitimate to uneducated buyers. It's the Chogokin Mazinger-Z and Gold Lightan counterfeit situation all over again.

I'd be okay with these if they were done in a smaller scale (like those World's Smallest Dinobots), or even if the packaging and toys indicated that these did not originate with Hasbro or Takara, but the fact that they didn't do this makes their intentions pretty clear.

It surprises me that you'd support these, Ray, given your persecution of the people passing off those fluorescent Force Commander/Baron Karzas on Micropolis a couple of years ago.

I wasn't the guy persecuting the Flouro magnos, I just sussed-out the details and published them. Recall I did credit their workmanship & creativity, only regretting that they sold them falsely as legitimate vintage pieces rather than simply offering them as elaborate customs. (An opinion not shared by some other collectors, certainly.) Considering the crazy prices magno pieces fetch, they'd have still made a pretty Lyra offering them as custom jobs (Jin Saitomi's work, anyone?), and probably would still be filling orders to this day...

But anyhow, I'm interested in some of the non-standard transparent or oddly-colored "remakes", and very curious where the market for them has gone since eBay nixed it. If its ethically bankrupt of me, then so be it. Call it my dark side. I don't expect anyone is making them to recapture any of their youth, but I do find it very interesting that they've cooked up variations that neatly fit certain interests in their buyers. Someone obviously understand the products.

AcroRay Wrote:
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> If its ethically bankrupt of me, then so be it.

At the end of the day, you have to live up to your own set of ethics.

As I said earlier, I'm not above buying unauthorized repros of vintage toys myself, as long as they're not being represented in any way as legitimate (i.e. having the original consent of the license holder and/or manufacturers). However, since these are being passed off by the original maker as legit, and I've seen first-hand how other parties have taken advantage of this, I won't give anyone involved in the enterprise one red cent, and that's because of my own personal ethics.

It's a "shades of gray" issue and I would imagine that everyone has a different viewpoint on the matter, nor do I expect to change anyone's mind. There's always the possibility that I might influence someone's opinion on the matter by lining out my thoughts, though, and that's why I'm participating in a thread that deals with toys that I have no personal stake in. ;p

Roger Wrote:
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> There's always the possibility that I might
> influence someone's opinion on the matter by
> lining out my thoughts, though, and that's why I'm
> participating in a thread that deals with toys
> that I have no personal stake in. ;p

They're all over Frank and Son's. My problem with them is that often I overhear people thinking they are either original or reproductions from Hasbro, and the sellers act like they're not sure. I quickly point out the truth, and inform them on the spot, in front of sellers I thought I knew fairly well.

Lately these have been falling in price, down to a more reasonable $40 (considering they were $80 when they first appeared). The alternate color versions in Diaclone and cartoon colors are pretty cool, and offer a more fun way to pick them up.

If the sellers would straight up offer them as knockoffs (some do) then it would be no different than the old KOs of years past. The quality is pretty good, very similar to the likes of Joons and the multitude of Microchange KOs from 20 years ago.

I just saw a Metroplex in box for $120. That seems low for an original, and high for a knockoff. The seller claimed it was original, but my response was "Who can tell nowadays? You sell this knockoff junk next to originals and now the waters are so muddied the whole market is screwed up."

He said people don't want originals anymore when they can get a "piece of history" for less and it's just as good. And people who know their shit can tell the difference.

This is from a guy who less than a year ago was selling an Optimus Prime with red feet and was dead certain that's how all Primes were.

This is what I'm talking about with unscrupulous sellers and the mindset that if the buyer is stupid enough to think it's original they deserve to get fleeced. That's how a con artist explains his profession, not a toy dealer.